UK Borders Bill

It is remarkable that we have only a dozen people in this Grand Committee and two of them have been the subjects of erroneous recognition. I am particularly alarmed by the story told us by the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, because it is an absolute calumny to describe her as the system did. I bitterly resent such a result from a system in the House of Lords. If we in the House of Lords cannot get it right, what likelihood is there that the tens of thousands of systems spread across the country will be more accurate? The noble Baroness mentioned the different levels of accuracy to which a system may be set, and as the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, will remember, we heard evidence in Sub-Committee F of the Select Committee on the European Union—I have the report on SIS II in front of me—when we were told by the expert witnesses that one can set the system to varying degrees of accuracy which would enable the fingerprint recognition system to let through a given percentage of false positives. The technology is not 100 per cent. The Minister should not pretend that we have a foolproof method of determining everyone's identity. He did not mention iris recognition but I shall not press him on that because, on a later amendment, I intend to discuss in greater detail the merits of iris recognition and what a pity it is that we have not persevered with that system as an alternative, although it is very difficult when the rest of Europe continues to go down the fingerprint route. Of course, we have the legacy of systems that are held by the police. Nevertheless, if much more reliable technology comes along, it would be a mistake for the Government to drop all research on it and not to keep it in reserve in case we find, to our horror, that the system, once in place, results in a great many false positives, or indeed lets people through who are not entitled to be in this country. Either way, it is regrettable if we had no other technology to fall back on. I accept, however, that the Government have very little option, considering what the Minister told us about the compatibility that we need with European systems and the need to carry on with the fingerprint system for the time being. He mentioned that the standard residence permit, which is being developed to require the inclusion of biometrics, will apply across the European Union, and thus our system must be aligned with it. I therefore fully accept that we have no option for the time being but to go down that route. I asked the Minister about the headings, and I would be grateful for an answer.